THE NORWICH SCHOOL AND OTHER PAINTERS

“All in the April morning, April airs were abroad. The sheep with their little lambs Pass’d me by on the road.”

There was formed in Norwich an association of painters that called itself the Norwich school of artists. Its leader and founder was a simple man of simple life, who has ever since been known as “Old Crome” (1768–1821). This designation of “old” is really to distinguish him from his son, who succeeded him in the leadership of the school. He was born at Norwich on December 8, 1768. His father kept a public-house, and he was brought up to be a coach painter, but he rebelled against his fate and he was apprenticed to a sign painter. He married very young. It was in 1805 that he gathered together the artists and formed the Norwich school. Its members had a common painting room; they held exhibitions, and their works became famous, that is the works of their leader John Crome, with whom was associated Cotman. But to us the Norwich school is Crome.

Hobbema was his spiritual ancestor, and the art of the Low Countries inspired him. To him the trees, the airy spaces, the sky with golden floating clouds, the solitude and stillness of out of the way places were all delight. Their spirit dwells in the aspects of nature that he was always striving for. He is the very reverse of Wilson, who always, as you know, sought some classic theme. Crome loved simple things. “Mousehold Heath” (689) is a representation of solitude and stillness—a grassy slope, a foreground of heath and thistles, golden clouds above. He knew a particular tree as you know the face of a friend, and he especially loved the oak. He had a perfect passion for fidelity; he loved shadow and sunshine, the shadow of deep places, the sunshine of the afternoon light. “Landscape—Slate Quarries” (1037), a picture of desolate Welsh slate quarries where men are labouring. “The Windmill” (926), a very suggestive picture of a mill set on a hill, and of a man trudging home from work.

This unaffected and genial man, honest and homely, cared only for the scenery of his own county; he lived and died at Norwich. We can imagine him every night going to the public-house as to an informal club, no more understanding what we call “impressionism” than he would have understood some new fangled word. He painted what he saw, and the things that appealed to him most were air and space.

He died in 1821, and if we read the local records of that time we shall see that there was a fine funeral given to him, that all the notable inhabitants of Norwich turned out to do honour to the man who had painted their county so faithfully. He left his son behind. He also did good work, but it is always of old Crome that we think when we mention the name. I like to remember him as he was, in his simple life, painting at his easel, or talking with his comrades of local affairs.

Cotman (1782–1842), was a foremost member of the Norwich school. He spent long years at Yarmouth, where he studied all things nautical. “River Scene” (1111)—wherries on the Yare—is a good example of his love and faithful observation of the sea.

If we turn from Norwich we find George Morland, prince of the painters of farmyards, who lived principally in London pot-houses. He was born in 1763. His life is a sad example of the power of dissipation over a great mind; it is a record of arrests, of fleeing from creditors, of going to jail for debt. We hear that he was arrested in 1799, and sent to prison and finally released in 1802, and that he died suddenly in 1806 while under arrest for debt. When his wife, who was the sister of William Ward, heard of his death, she succumbed to the shock, and both were buried on a November day.

Nothing can be sadder than George Morland’s life and death; he was a man of genius, the painter of England’s rural life in its homeliest aspect. It was the common things that interested him, and there was no misery for him in doing common tasks. If you look at “The Inside of a Stable” (1030), see how beautifully the two horses and a pony are painted, how exquisite and how tender is the light and shade, how charming is the whole atmosphere of the picture. Unfortunate George Morland, gifted and debased in taste, who loved the humble animals, and led a life that would have shamed them! We can but think of him with sorrow as we look at this beautiful picture, glorified with the light of real genius.

Stothard (1755–1834) is the very opposite of George Morland. He was orderly, a modest, contented man, and thus he remained to the end of his life. The son of a well-to-do innkeeper in Long Acre, delicate in health, his gentle spirit never rebelled against the existing order of things. He was always drawing in childhood, so his father apprenticed him to a draughtsman of patterns for brocaded silks, and the boy took very happily to his work. His father died and his mother placed him under an artist, and all her son’s feeling for grace came out in his drawings. There was a sweet, grave humour about him that found expression in his art. He began to devote himself to illustration, and this turned out to be the work of his life; in it he is without a rival. Perhaps the finest thing he ever did was the “Pilgrimage to Canterbury” (1163). It is a long, horizontal composition, in which are numerous figures, all mounted on horseback riding in cavalcade. It is quite delightful to trace the different pilgrims—“The Knight and his Son,” “the Yonge Squier,” “the Wife of Bath,” talking with such winsome coquetry to the Pardoner, “The Clerk of Oxenford,” the Nun talking to her superior, the lady Prioress, “Madame Eglentyne,” and all the goodly company that is described in the prologue to Chaucer’s “Canterbury Tales.” The freshness of the May morning is conveyed in this enchanting frieze. “A Greek Vintage” (317) is a graceful illustration, full of innocent gaiety.

Stothard had a great feeling for grace of costume. I must not dwell longer upon him. I have seen his portrait painted in his old age, and it is the face of a man of dignity and delicate observation, one possessed of more sweetness of temperament than of vigour. He died in 1834. He was neither rich nor poor, but much esteemed and much honoured by all who knew him.